A celebrated Gastonia restaurant will soon be back on the seafood scene.

The revived Lineberger’s Fish Camp brings back revered family recipes for tartar and cocktail sauce, catfish and flounder — and has some other surprises in store for folks who remember the original, promises co-owner Titus Greene.

And yes, he assures us, there will be a candy counter.

“When we’ve told people in town, that’s always the first thing they ask,” he says. “Are you going to have a candy store?”

But it doesn’t take fish fans long to remember the seafood that brought droves of people to Gastonia over the decades and often clogged traffic outside the building where Lineberger’s Fish Fry stood.

The new restaurant with the locally hallowed name is a partnership between Greene, a longtime restaurateur, his daughter and son-in-law and a grandson of original Lineberger’s founders Luther and Stella Lineberger.

Greene owns the building at 1101 Union Road where the seafood eatery will open. The former Market Street owner and Western Sizzlin’ franchisee bought the building when it was still home to Cantlupe’s Italian Restaurant.

After Wes Lineberger approached Greene about getting back into the family business, Greene brought in daughter and son-in-law Pam and Larry Walker.

“Our goal is to bring back Lineberger’s and bring it back to the same quality it was,” Greene says.

“We’re depending a lot on Wes Lineberger and his experience and expertise.”

Lineberger worked at his family’s restaurant from childhood and brought many of his ancestral seafood secrets to the new eatery, according to owners.

Greene and his wife, Gail, spent many a happy dinnertime at Lineberger’s Fish Fry.

Titus Greene still refers to the place as “Luther’s” after the man who opened the original.

He can remember walking in the restaurant, passing through the wide candy store and wondering at the old-fashioned wax bottle candies and other sugary throwbacks.

Oh Henry! candy bars and other retro sweets will have a place of honor at the new Lineberger’s Fish Camp, too.

The copycat candy store will be named Gail’s after Greene’s wife and part of the money from the sweets will go toward the Alzheimer’s Foundation.

The original Lineberger’s Fish Fry opened in 1948 and sold to new owners 50 years later. Fire destroyed the South New Hope Road building soon after, although later owners had it rebuilt. The site is now home to Amber Jack Seafood & Steaks.